


Father

by CoffeeJay



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Daddy Issues, Gen, Guilt, Introspection, Malcolm Bright Needs a Hug, One Shot, Self-Hatred, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-24
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:54:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23821912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoffeeJay/pseuds/CoffeeJay
Summary: Malcolm considers the many labels he has given Martin Whitly over the years.
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Martin Whitly
Comments: 2
Kudos: 33





	Father

Dad had been such a simple word, before. When Malcolm was small, Dad was a caretaker, a teacher, the hero who saved lives at the hospital every day, a warm pair of arms around Malcolm before bed. Dad had been a simple word, like Mom, like family, like home.

Lieutenant Arroyo was the man who appeared when everything collapsed. He was kindly, and firm, and he was the one who took Dad away. He was the one who removed the killer from Malcolm’s home, and Malcolm was the one who, in his darkest moments, had resented him for it.

Only for a time. After all, Dad had set the bomb, and Malcolm had been the one to light the fuse, to make the call that would tear his home apart.

Home was another word that Malcolm couldn’t understand anymore.

Dr. Whitly came next. Dr. Whitly wasn’t Dad, just like Malcolm Bright was not Malcolm Whitly. Not anymore, and perhaps not ever. He was a terrible man, and a brilliant man, and sometimes, when the teacher or the hero peered out from behind the murderer, Dr. Whitly looked far much too much like Dad for Malcolm to accept.

Father was a clinical term, one that suggested a biological connection, a legal connection, a circumstantial bond. There didn’t have to be any warmth tied up in it, not like with Dad. Dad was too soft a monicker, too loving, too caring, too steady— too much like Gil. 

Gil was a good man, and Dr. Whitly was not. These were facts. Sometimes, Malcolm could look at Gil and see Dad, and that left him with a hollow ache in his chest. Gil was a good man, and Malcolm was not his child. But then sometimes, by hateful accident, Malcolm Bright saw Dad in Dr. Whitly, and part of him understood in those moments why he could never have been the child of a good man.

After all, what kind of man was he that he could know Lieutenant Arroyo, know the Surgeon, know that they were nothing alike--

\--and still give them both the same name?


End file.
